UNITY DAYA guide to celebrating Unity Day with young students

©2014, PACER Center, Inc.

What are your true colors when it comes to bullying? If you care about students who are bullied and want bullying to end, make your color

ORANGE on Unity Day. That’s the day everyone can link together — in schools, communities and online — and send one large ORANGE message of

support to students who have been bullied.

Celebrate!

On UNITY Day:

1. Encourage your students to wear the color orange. It can be an orange T-shirt, an orange tie, an orange hat, or even an orange band. Wearing orange is a sign that you support those who have been bullied and are uniting to make a difference.

2. “Unite Against Bullying” banners are a great way for students at your school to make a powerful visual statement of support on Unity Day. Hang the banner in a prominent place where kids can sign it and show that they care.

3. Set up a “unity” table. Hand out orange “unity ribbons.” To create your own ribbons, purchase a spool of orange ribbon (5/8-inch wide) at a craft or dollar store. Cut them into 12-inch strips, or use orange strips of construction paper. With a black marker write “UNITY,” “The End of Bullying Begins With Me,” or create your own bullying prevention message on each strip before having the students tie them around their wrists or their backpacks.

Classroom Discussion

1. Have students look up the definition of “unity.” According to Webster’s English Dictionary:

Unity. noun, plural u•ni•ties. The state of being one; oneness of mind, feeling; concord, harmony, or agreement.

2. Make a list of synonyms for unity with students. Possible answers include: harmony, peace, consensus, solidarity, or agreement.

3. Discuss what unity means to each of them, their school, and their community — and how it relates to preventing bullying and creating a safer school. Reflect on the statement, “When we stand together, no one stands alone.”

4. Discuss how you can show unity in your classroom.

5. Decide on a classroom UNITY project, such as Project Connect (next page).

A Way to Unite: Project Connect

Project Connect joins students, schools, and communities to make a powerful statement about uniting against bullying. The process is simple. Students write a message on a strip of orange construction paper.

• Create the strips (links) using sheets of 8½ x 11-inch ORANGE construction paper

• Cut into strips 1½ to 2 inches wide and 11 inches long.

The strips are then stapled or glued together, resulting in one long connected chain that visually represents the power of uniting for a common cause.

1. Ask students to write what they do to help make their school a safer place for their peers OR ask students to write a quality that makes them unique and proud of who they are as individuals.

2. Once individual classrooms have connected their chains, they can link them to another classroom’s, until all classrooms have joined together to create one colossal chain representing the school.

3. The links can then be displayed in the classroom or in the school hallway. A creative way to display is to spell out the word “UNITE” or your school name.

The message is this — while one person can speak out against bullying, our message is much stronger when we come together to make a difference.

Special thanks to Citrus Grove Elementary in Palm City, Florida for sharing the inspiration behind Project Connect.

PACER.org/BullyingThis is the portal for parents and educators to access bullying resources, including educational toolkits, awareness toolkits, contest ideas, promotional products, and more.

PACERTeensAgainstBullying.orgCreated by and for teens, this website is a place for students in middle school and high school to find ways to address bullying, take action, be heard, and “own” an important social cause.

PACERKidsAgainstBullying.orgA creative, innovative, and educational website designed for elementary school students to learn about bullying prevention, engage in activities, and be inspired to take action.

952.838.9000 | 952.838.0199 FAX | 888.248.0822 | Bullying411@PACER.orgPACER Center | 8161 Normandale Blvd. | Minneapolis, MN 55437

© 2014, PACER Center, Inc. All rights reserved. No portion of this booklet may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of PACER Center, except for brief quotations or critical reviews.

Founded in 2006, PACER’s National Bullying Prevention Center, actively leads social change, so that bullying is no longer considered an accepted childhood rite of passage. PACER provides innovative resources for students, parents, educators, and others, and recognizes bullying as a serious community issue that impacts education, physical and emotional health, and the safety and well-being of students.